Emigration from India and utilization of remittances at household level

Migration is a natural phenomenon which has been in practice from ages. People migrate from one place to another in search of livelihood and for a better standard of living. In this context, International labour migration provides a good opportunity. There are not enough studies taken up on the subject, in this backdrop, this study grabs the wonderful opportunity of exploring the recently available data of 64th round of National Sample Survey (schedule 10.2) and tries to assess the use of remittances by the receiving household. Results suggest that 55percent of remittances are used for food, followed by debt repayment (18 %), health (7%). Surprisingly, 0.6% households are reported to use the remittances for education. The age has a positive association with sending remittances to their families. Regression analysis shows that variations among states, religion and livelihood opportunity with regard to emigration and utilization of remittances received by the emigrant’s households are also noteworthy. The study finds that there has been considerable impact of remittances provided by emigrants which play a vital life to their families. The study shows that rate of emigration indicate that higher for highest quintiles while the share of sent remittances is greater for lower and lowest quintile.